The Blanket Fort
by apigeonandaquill
Summary: What happens when the Five decide to build a blanket fort at Oxford and spend a night in the same room. Nikola really doesn't want to go to sleep; everybody else does. Shenanigans ensue.


**The Five, at Oxford, at Night-time. Enjoy. Some things that could be slash, but so mild- I never go graphic, so -shrug-. Don't see why it's a problem, really.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Sanctuary, which is a pity. If I did, it wouldn't have been cancelled.**

**The Blanket Fort**

* * *

**10:30pm: **James is working on three different essays at once, Helen is working on one for tomorrow. John is writing poetry and taking obvious little glances at Helen as he tries to find inspiration. Nikola and Nigel are playing chess, Nikola completely quiet for the first time all evening as he concentrates. All of the Five inwardly breathe a sigh of relief at that fact; as before Nigel suggested Chess, Nikola hadn't shut up snarking all day and while it was endearing, it was also terribly distracting.

**10:45pm: **Nikola wins his chess match against Nigel. Nigel is a good sport about it, unlike Nikola would have been had he lost. Nikola decides distracting James from his work would be a good idea. Snarking match begins, James wins with a logical comment that doubles as an excellent counter-snark, Nikola pouts, Nigel laughs.

**11:00pm: **Helen finishes her essay with a flourish. James' panic is growing, as is his level of tiredness.

**11:25pm: **James is nearly asleep at his desk. John puts down his pen and suggests they all go to bed. Nikola refuses. Brings in bedcovers from his room and sets them down on the floor. John scoops them up and makes to take them back. Tug-of-war occurs. John falls over, Nikola is laughing. John admits defeat. Nikola can sleep on the floor if he wants to.

**11:42pm: **James admits defeat, and abandons his essay till the morning as all the words are starting to swim together. Is so tired he doesn't know his way to his bedroom. Nikola suggests a sleepover. James worries that it's improper if Helen sleeps with them. Nikola reminds James he's already seen much more of Helen than what's proper anyway, so why bother about it? James admits Nikola has a point. John considers asking what all of this is implying, but decides it would probably be best if he didn't know. Helen gives him a sweet, innocent smile. James is almost asleep on his feet.

**11:55pm: **Proper blanket fort set out on the floor, as per Nikola's request. James settles down and concedes that actually, this is surprisingly comfortable. John slides in between James and Helen, wrapping one arm around either of them, Nikola gets in at the other side of James and cuddles up to Nigel. All Five agree that this is rather nice.

**12:15am: **James whispers a soft 'goodnight', and starts drifting off to sleep, his head on John's chest and his hand linked with Helen's, James and Helen's foreheads almost touching. Nikola makes an inappropriate comment along the lines of that the three of them made a "beautiful trio" and should "sleep together more often". James cracks one eye open, John shoots Nikola a glare of death, and Helen just giggles.

**12:30am: **Nigel falls asleep and starts snoring softly. Nikola bursts out laughing, wakes Nigel up. Nigel infers that Nikola has illegitimate upbringing. Nikola responds with an appropriate snark. John groans quietly and hopes they're not going to start again. They do.

**1:00am: **Snarking match still going on. James is trying to doze through it regardless. Helen tells them both to be quiet and go to sleep. They don't.

**1:05am: **Helen tells them to be quiet and go to sleep right now or she'll personally write letters to their fathers. Snarking match ends in a ceasefire.

**1:30am: **James finally falls asleep. Helen drifts off, John is lying awake and thinking too-deep thoughts. Nikola is wide awake too. Decides to cease boredom by snarking at John. John is too tired to come up with a good response. Nikola declares that he has won and John is a 'doozy'. John retorts that he is an English student and doesn't even know what 'doozy' means. He contests that Nikola has made that word up. Nikola pouts.

**2:07am: **Nikola rolls onto Nigel and knocks him out of bed. Nigel fully awake now and grumbly. Gets back on again. They snuggle back up together, Nikola whispering things so sweet that John thinks he's hallucinating, and Nigel smiling softly, happy now that he was enveloped in love.

**3:23am: **Nigel starts singing '99 bottles of beer on the wall' apparently thinking it's under his breath. Naturally, it's loud enough to wake Helen and James, who both give him a combined glare-of-death for disturbing them. Nikola starts giggling. James turns and raises his eyebrow, only to find the vampire's drifted off to sleep and is giggling at his dreams. James smiles; he can't help it. The blissful look on Nikola's face is adorable. He wishes he had something to record it with.

**3:45am: **James declares that he now has no chance of getting back to sleep. Tries to get up, John pulls him back down onto the bed and hugs him close. James accepts the cuddle, as this is quite nice really. Tries to get back to sleep.

**3:47 am: **Nikola wakes up and makes an inappropriate comment about James and John and their 'extra curricular activities'. Both James and John agree that that attempt at a snark was utterly pathetic and that Nikola should probably leave it to when he was more awake. Nikola retorts that 'you're only saying that cause it's true'. James and John refuse to comment, Helen looks at them both and considers some very interesting ideas.

**4:34 am: **James gives in to getting no more sleep, and gets up, going to play his violin. Everyone else, who had fallen back to sleep, wakes up again at the noise. Nikola, to retaliate, infers that James enjoys the bedtime company of horses. John glances at Nikola, eyebrows disappearing into his hairline, thinking 'where on earth did you get that from?' Helen tells Nikola off for being rude. Nikola tells her that she's beautiful. Helen informs Nikola that she belongs to John and James only. Nikola beams broadly and says 'so you are all together, then.' James turns an interesting colour of crimson.

**5:00am: **Nikola has gone back to sleep and is now so closely intertwined with Nigel that it's hard to see where his body ends and Nigel's begins. James remarks on how sweet they are. Helen wonders aloud if there is 'anything going on'. John shrugs, though says that he hopes there is, so that Nikola might stop flirting quite so much.

**5:14am: **Nikola wakes with a scream from a terrible nightmare. Nigel wakes as well, and there's a wild scramble as the two try to disentangle themselves from the covers and each other. Nikola's terrified thrashing demolishes the blanket fort. James reaches Nikola first and pulls him close, rubbing his back soothingly. Nikola tells them not to tell anyone. James assures him he won't, and asks him if he'd like a hot milk. Nikola says he would. Both of them leave for the kitchens. The people in the next dorm bang on the wall.

**6:00am: **James and Nikola return from the kitchens. John is back to writing poetry by candelight, dawn's light is coming through the curtains and the birds are starting to twitter. Helen reads John's latest poem and realises it's not quite for her. She thinks it's beautiful. John glances up at James with a smile. Helen remarks innocently that James is really quite beautiful, too. James and John flush pink. Helen smiles softly. Nikola goes back to bed and acts like nothing just happened.

**6:30am: **James remarks that they are never, ever sleeping as a Five again. He's completely exhausted with a class starting in one hour. He sits back down on the bed to talk to Helen and drink his tea while Nikola and Nigel sleep. He falls back to sleep himself on Helen's shoulder. The tea goes cold unnoticed.

**6:44am: **John gives up on writing his poetry, blows out his candle and walks back over to the bed. Nikola and Nigel are curled up together, sleeping peacefully with smiles on their faces. James is still asleep on Helen's shoulder, and Helen's asleep again too, her head resting against James'. John kisses them both on the tops of their heads, and then lays himself down at Helen's other side. He decides he'll have five more minutes. He closes his eyes.

**4:30pm: **James wakes up and realises that he never went to any of his classes all day. He panicks for a moment and scatters his papers all over the floor as he desperately searches for his essays to hand in, only to find a little note left on the sideboard. He picks it up wonderingly, and for a moment, is worried and upset that someone else had been in their room, especially with who it was. Then, he reads the note, and he can't quite help but smile.

'_Came in to see how you were and why you weren't in Physics. Saw you all sleeping. Handed in all your work for you. You can thank me with a drink later,_

_Adam.'_

James looks at the others, all starting to slowly wake up. He concedes that perhaps, last night wasn't such a terrible idea after all.


End file.
